Cloud Solutions for DevOps

Cloud platforms give DevOps engineers a lot of freedom. They receive the required level of abstraction abilities, transferring the core competencies associated with the operation of the infrastructure to the cloud. There is no need to think about how to implement a virtualization system, or how to orchestrate containers and organize an application microservice architecture — these are ready-made services that you can use.

AWS Cloud

Amazon Web Services is a rich cloud platform that provides over 200 full-feature data center services. AWS is a comprehensive, easy-to-use computing platform offered by Amazon.

AWS offers services to subscribers on both the infrastructure model (virtual servers, storage) and the platform layer (cloud databases, cloud middleware, development tools). The platform is developed based on a combination of infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS) and packaged software as a service (SaaS).

Amazon Web Services offers the following services:

• Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2). The service provides subscribers with virtual server platforms, storage systems and a load balancer. Users can choose either a preconfigured server with a preinstalled operating system or build it themselves. The service also allows you to create your own images or use your OS.
  
• Simple Storage (S3) provides subscribers with shared storage space with a maximum of 5 TB. S3 stores files in so-called buckets, which are located on different Amazon sites.
  
• Relational Database Service provides users with a virtual database that is located on a dedicated server. At the same time, the platform is configured and optimized for the selected database. Access is configured depending on the wishes of users and security policies. For example, customers can allow connections only from certain IP addresses or for those security groups that are specified in the EC2 service.
  
• Route 53 gives users the ability to set up a DNS server in the Amazon cloud. The service integrates easily with other AWS services.

Azure Cloud

Microsoft Azure is a cloud platform that provides users with tools for computing, storing information, and hosting applications.

Azure Cloud has the following features:

• Hybrid Use. The benefits of public and private clouds come together in a hybrid cloud that helps you set up Azure.
  
• Flexibility. It works with any systems, languages, tools, and platforms. Leverage the Windows and Linux ecosystems to build cross-platform web applications.
  
• Economical. Competitive prices are achieved through pay-per-minute. You choose which resources you use and when.
  
• Infrastructure building. At the heart of Azure is the use of virtual machines and management tools. This helps to scale the system, ensure its reliability and stability. You don't need to rent an Azure virtual server.
  
• Access throttling. Manage user groups, sync with existing directories, and use single sign-on to Microsoft Cloud Azure.

There are over 600 services in the Azure Cloud Services Catalog, divided into 21 categories. Each service has detailed documentation describing functionality and usage scenarios.

For example, Azure Active Directory is an access control tool. It helps organize the entry of employees into the system and access to resources.

Microsoft Azure Storage helps create backups. The tools provide compatibility at the server and database levels. This allows developers and administrators to run copies of the site directly from the cloud.

The Windows Azure platform also provides services for developing mobile applications, the Internet of Things (IoT), computing, and setting up Windows Virtual Desktop. In general, this is a universal set that covers the needs of even the largest companies.

Kubernetes

Kubernetes is a portable, extensible, open-source platform for managing containerized workloads and services that facilitates both declarative configuration and automation. The platform supports the main containerization technologies, including Docker and Rkt. With Kubernetes, it is also possible to support hardware virtualization technologies.

Application containerization is one of the key concepts in the Kubernetes deployment automation.

Benefits of containerization:

• ease and flexibility of application deployment;
• continuity of creation, integration, and deployment of the container with the ability to quickly roll back changes;
• creation of application containers during the build / release process and separation of the application from the hardware infrastructure;
• identity of the development and testing environment on the server and developer terminals (laptops, PCs);
• the ability to transfer applications between clouds and operating systems;
• separation of applications into isolated, distributed, flexible microservices with dynamic deployment and management.

Containers themselves are a way to deploy and run applications on a server. If there are several containers, it is important to configure their joint work correctly. This is to ensure the resources of the hardware platform are spent efficiently, and not having containers pulling those resources away from each other.

In addition to deploying and running containers, the developer needs to periodically fix bugs. Doing this manually is difficult, but Kubernetes allows you to automate most of the processes.

System management is based on two approaches:

• Declarative. The developer sets the goals, and not the ways to achieve them, which the system automatically chooses itself;
• Imperative. The developer can manage resources using the “Create,” “Edit,” and “Delete” commands.